Talk:Maxwell's equations

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Does this article actually explain anything?[change source]

This article doesn't have any useful substance (at least for the uninitiated) and certainly does not qualify as being written in "simple English". Sure, the opening sentence is a simple explanation, but the article itself is just a quick reference sheet for those who already understand the theories and mathematics involved. The "regular" English version of the article is much more informative, particularly for the non science experts, because it explains what they represent and why they are useful. It certainly isn't what one expects from a "simple" explanation.

I don't like being so harsh when it's clear that someone put some effort into this (not just copying and pasting from the English article and then even updating it), but it isn't at all helpful for those of us seeking a "simple" explanation; the English article explains it better (though I'd still have to jump around a little and take a few years of calculus to really understand it, I suppose). Cuteswan 13:46, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Seriously?[change source]

In this article we get "Here is the 4-current, is the field strength tensor (written as a 4 × 4 matrix), is the Levi-Civita symbol, and is the 4-gradient (so that is the d'Alembertian operator). (The a in the first equation is implicitly summed over, according to Einstein notation.) The first tensor equation says the same thing as the two inhomogeneous Maxwell's equations: Gauss' law and Ampere's law with Maxwell's correction. The second equation say the same thing as the other two equations, the homogeneous equations: Faraday's law of induction and the absence of magnetic monopoles." while in "Particle Accelerator" we get "A particle accelerator, also called an atom smasher, is a machine that uses electric fields to speed up tiny things called particles with an electric charge to very high speeds"

del operator and tensors?[change source]

Wow, the fact that this article uses the del operator and mentions tensors is laughable. Haha, "Simple English." I think it's a great idea as well as a neccessity to have a simple english wiki article on the Maxwell equations since they come up more commonly than a lot of other physics topics and the regular wikipedia page is extremely technical for an average reader. I'm pretty sure these equations are taught at least at a high school level if not earlier in middle school in a much simpler form. Including the differential forms, as well as H, or D, is also not "simple" english or even close. Maybe this page should just explain the simpler specific case/symmetry case, forms of these equations. Basically, only applicable to magnetostatics and electrostatics, with notes mentioning that they are specific to electrostatics and magnetostatics and possibly including either the exact forms at the bottom or a link to the regular english wikipedia page for those who are interested in learning more... it really shouldn't require 2 years of calculus and at least a year of college level physics to understand the basic physical ideas behind electricity and magnetism. This information needs to be more accessable to the average person. Drgribb (talk) 06:19, 13 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Good questions...[change source]

All the above are good comments and questions. Obviously the page is unsatisfactory. Unfortunately we do not have a regular editor who is familiar with this field. There are topics where genuine expertise is essential. Some of these topics we can cover; some we cannot. Macdonald-ross (talk) 12:35, 18 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Later comments[change source]

I think we can now better understand this controversy.

  1. The intro is reasonably straightforward, given that the reader has advanced school physics.
  2. The later sections require a real knowledge of physics. It is ridiculous to think we can simplify this without losing its essential content. We have the same problem with many branches of physics, and with some of the other sciences. The comments above go back to 2006, when the possibilities of a simpler form of English was new on the wiki. We should never have claimed or believed that any kind of human knowledge could be adequately stated in simple language. Obviously it can't. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:28, 28 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]